Commercial walk behind mowers typically are used by landscaping and grounds care professionals. Commercial walk behind mowers have heavy duty floating mower decks that are wide enough for housing two or three rotary cutting blades. Belt drives are commonly used to transmit rotational power from the engine power take off to pulleys on cutting blade spindles. Commercial walk behind mowers also have a pair of drive wheels behind the deck, rotated by a self-propelled drive system. The self-propelled drive system may be a gear drive, belt drive or infinitely variable hydrostatic system for ground speed adjustment.
Commercial walk behind mower operator controls typically include handgrips and operator control levers to rotate the drive wheels and steer the mower by rotating the drive wheels at different speeds. The controls also may include an operator presence system with bails that must be depressed to operate the mower. In the past, many commercial walk behind mower operator controls included a pair of rearwardly extending pistol grips with various grip and lever configurations the operator must squeeze. Examples of these commercial walk behind mower operator controls are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,879,867; 4,920,733; 5,020,308; 5,077,959; 5,127,215; 5,651,241; 5,848,520 and 6,935,446. Pistol grip operator controls work in a vertical plane and do not place the operator's arms and wrists in an ideal ergonomic position. Other commercial walk behind mower operator controls include a rigid handlebar or support member that is generally horizontal, along with a pair of pivoting levers that move fore and aft to steer the wheels. Examples are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,511,367; 5,809,755; and 6,868,657. Other designs for commercial walk behind mower operator controls have included horizontal handlebars without rigid support members, such as U.S. Pat. No. 7,740,091. The horizontal handlebar may pivot on a vertical axis, and places the operator's hands in a horizontal plane that is more ergonomically friendly. However, it is more complex, requires more parts that are subject to wear, and requires more service and adjustment from normal use. Other commercial walk behind mower operator controls include a handlebar with hand grips that are inclined upwardly and towards one another, a control lever next to each hand grip, each control lever pivotable about a pivot axis that is substantially parallel to the grip axis of the corresponding hand grip. Examples of these operator controls are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,557,331 and 6,951,092.
Commercial walk behind mower operator controls are needed that provide an ergonomically friendly operator position for daily mowing work, and provide control functions that are desirable, but with fewer components and wear points. It would be desirable to provide commercial walk behind mower operator controls having a lower cost to manufacture, adjust and repair than existing controls.